Georgian Bay Steelhead Weekend

[solopaddler]

My friend Dave had been trying to pin me down for months to help him take his 2 young boys Tyler and Isaac aged 8 and 9 fishing for a couple days, and this was the weekend.

I found us a decent cottage right on the river, and booked it for Fri/Sat nights so the accomodations were set...

We arrived around 2pm Friday afternoon, checked into the cottage then hit the river for the afternoon/evening bite.

Here's a couple shots of the cottage

Anyhow, after the last couple of days I have to say I'm DREADING my kids reaching

that age.

The 2 boys, or as I like to call them SPAWN OF SATAN , were, how can I say this nicely, a handful!

Honestly I can't even begin to describe how chaotic the last day and 1/2 was...but I tried!

Here's Tyler set up on a nice stable rock fishing late Friday afternoon

And the two of them geared up with hardware casting the surf

Shortly after I took this photo they BOTH fell in the lake soaking themselves, and breaking

one of my Avids in the process.

Suffice it to say they both fell in the water multiple times over the course of the 2 days.

Anyhow, it was impossible for us to concentrate on our fishing as the kids demanded pretty much

all of our attention, so no fish were caught.

The next day we hit another river, and Isaac decided he didn't feel like fishing, so without either Dave

or myself knowing he propped my other Avid and Daiwa 1300 against the van and went frolicking in the river.

By the time I noticed he had no rod and asked him where it was, it was gone. It was a busy access

point and someone had stolen it in the 1/2 hour it was lying there unattended .

What are ya gonna do?

The highlight of the weekend for the boys: in the cottage was a shelf with a bunch of knick knacks lined up. Take note of the box on the far left.

 

Here's a close-up of it, they thought it was hysterical (we all did actually )

 

Had a campfire last night to cap off the trip which the boys loved (until we were attacked by 2

seemingly feral pit bulls....seriously!)

So not a single fish was landed over the 11/2 days (although both Dave and myself briefly had large fish on which we lost).

The main thing was that despite being constantly wet the boys had a great time.

Note to self though: do NOT outfit young boys with high end equipment!

 

I'm gonna go pour myself a drink now....

[Whopper]

Sorry don't mean to laugh Mike (but I am ) fishing with youngsters can be a challenge, been there done that. Don't know how much equipment I went through when the kids were young.

Another life leason learned I guess.

At least you got out, you could be in my shoes

I've said this before but I'll say it again, how low is it for someone to steal anothers fishing rod, jeesh

[Joey]

Sorry to hear about your equipment, especially the stolen rod. Hope the dude that took it gets his/hers in the end

 

Good on ya for taking the time to get the boys out there. I'll bet they'll remember this trip throughout their lives. If you think they were a handful, just try to remember some of the things you "might" have done at their age

 

Looks like a nice cottage and that pasta box is hysterical. Surprised nobody's lifted that yet from a rental property.

 

Great report fish or no fish

 

Joey

[irishfield]

Nice report Mike and despite the losses....memories are in there somewhere ! LOL

[Mike Pike]

Wow, I sure hope your buddy appreciates what a great friend he has! Also hope he'll compensate ya for the broken rod at least.

 

That's really nice of you to take the weekend and try get his boys into some fish. Yup, when they're that young, you might as well forget about doing any fishing yourself. Perhaps planning a less ambitious half day trip with the boyz next time would be a little better( and easier on your nerves! ).

 

Good on ya, though, Solo!